🔗 Share this article

Amid crimson theater drapes at a well-known Oslo location for LGBTQ+ gatherings, Norway's national church issued a formal apology for harm and unequal treatment perpetrated over the years.

“The church in Norway has brought LGBTQ+ individuals harm, suffering and humiliation,” the lead bishop, the church leader, announced this Thursday. “It was wrong for this to take place and that is why today I say sorry.”

“Unequal treatment, harassment and discrimination” led to certain individuals abandoning their faith, Tveit acknowledged. A worship service at Oslo Cathedral was scheduled to come after the apology.

The statement of regret occurred at a venue called London Pub, a bar that was one of two targeted in the 2022 violent incident that killed two people and injured nine people severely during Oslo’s Pride celebrations. A Norwegian of Iranian origin, who swore loyalty to Islamic State, was sentenced to a minimum of three decades in prison for the murders.

Like many religions around the world, Norway's church – a Lutheran evangelical community that is the most extensive faith community in the country – historically excluded LGBTQ+ individuals, preventing them from serving as pastors or to marry in church. Back in the 1950s, bishops of the church described gay people as a “social danger of global proportions”.

Yet, with Norwegian society turning more progressive, emerging as the world's second to allow same-sex registered partnerships in 1993 and during 2009 the first Scandinavian country to allow same-sex marriage, the church slowly followed.

Back in 2007, Norway's church started appointing homosexual ministers, and gay and lesbian couples have been able to have church weddings from 2017 onward. During 2023, the bishop took part in the Oslo Pride event in what was described as an unprecedented step for the church.

The apology on Thursday was met with varied responses. The director of a group of Christian lesbians in Norway, Hanne Marie Pedersen-Eriksen, who is also a gay pastor, referred to it as “an important reparation” and a point in time that “signaled the conclusion of a painful era within the church's past”.

According to Stephen Adom, the leader of Norway’s Association for Gender and Sexual Diversity, the statement was “meaningful and vital” but had come “too late for those among us who died of Aids … with deep sorrow in their hearts as the church regarded the disease as punishment from God”.

Internationally, a handful of religious institutions have attempted to make amends for their past behavior regarding LGBTQ+ individuals. During 2023, the Church of England expressed regret for what it referred to as its “shameful” treatment, though it still declines to allow same-sex marriages in church.

In a similar vein, Ireland's Methodist Church last year issued an apology for its “failures in pastoral support and care” regarding the LGBTQ+ community and their families, but held fast in its belief that marriage could only be a union between a man and a woman.

Several months ago, Canada's United Church delivered a statement of regret to Two-Spirit and LGBTQIA+ groups, characterizing it as a reaffirmation of its “pledge to complete acceptance and open hospitality” in every part of the church's activities.

“We have failed to celebrate and delight in all of your beautiful creation,” Michael Blair, the top administrative leader of the church, said. “We caused pain to people rather than pursuing healing. We express our regret.”